Friday, May 25, 2018

Kubuntu on Dell XPS 15 9550

I want to share my 3-week experience with Linux. Previous time I used Linux 8-12 years ago in the university. Then I became a designer, started working with Photoshop, 3D Studio Max, Rhinoceros. So, I switched to Windows.

But now I am a developer and Unix systems became much more interesting for me. So, the choose is Mac or Linux.
I love Mac, but why not Mac?
  1. Bad integrated graphics. Integrated Intel graphics is too slow for me. And I want to work with latest OpenGL, CL, Gpu-compute stuff. Discrete graphics is much better. I am NVidia fan, but maybe later I`ll try AMD gaming GPU on my desktop.
  2. I find it too expensive for laptop with bad graphics, how do you think?
  3. Mac is limited in desktop/laptop/mobile systems. I want more.
I tried different Linux distros.
First of all, when you are trying Linux, you must understand, that Linux is not a product, it is community. There are no reason to claim, when something does not work. You should look for the way to improve something in Linux forums, ask question, if you can't find an answer (be polite!), or don't torture yourself with Linux.

Linux installs you.

So. Why Kubuntu?
I tried some distros:
  1. First I installed Mint I like stability and nothing-excess-approach. But some of packages are too old, for example xorg. Without new xorg, VSync will not work. You will see tearing. Installing newer version, visual artifacts made my eyes bleeding. Sometimes system booted without Wi-Fi connection. And no driver for webcam. Anyway, I think, Mint is good enough, I use it on my desktop machine.
  2. Arch started without desktop enviroment is it ok?
  3. Manjaro something went wrong during booting from USB. Kernel panic. It's not meant to be.
  4. Ubuntu and Kubuntu just work. Wi-Fi, webcam, NVidia driver, wow! 💗 
 I like KDE, so I chose Kubuntu.
 What to do after install?
  1. No VSync on proprietary NVidia driver. To fix it:- create a new file in /etc/modprobe.d/nvidia-drm-nomodeset.conf
    - insert a line options nvidia-drm modeset=1
    - sudo update-initramfs -u
    - reboot (I got this info here).
  2. Enabling synaptics driver, if your touchpad settings are grey: 
    sudo apt install xserver-xorg-input-synaptics
  3. Do you want Mac-style touchpad gestures? You are welcome here. Don't forget install git before.
And now it is awesome! I'm afraid to do something else :D
 

Thank you for watching ;)

Feel free to improve my mistakes, English is not my native language.
Or giving an advice in Linux, I'm not a pro yet.

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